10 lessons learned from reviewing award winning submissions

Winning a business award is a prestigious accomplishment in anyone’s book. Achieving such high-level industry recognition has the power to enhance your company’s reputation, attract new clients, and motivate your employees. But of course, not everyone can win. So just what is it that makes one entry stand out from all the others? Here’s a rundown on lessons we’ve learned from decades of writing award-winning submissions.

Alignment with award criteria

Every award question will have well-defined criteria and guidelines. Judges look for entries that meet or exceed the outlined requirements and clearly address all aspects of each question. Strict adherence to guidelines and criteria demonstrates your attention to detail and sends a strong message to judges that you’re a serious competitor in the race to win.

Whilst we’re on the subject of criteria, each question will almost certainly have a strict word count limit. These can vary between questions, with any words over the limit disregarded. Winning award submissions are those that make strategic use of the word allowances available, choosing each word for clarity and impact, making sure to waste none in simply repeating the question, for example.

Lesson 1: Carefully review the award criteria and be confident that the award you’re considering entering is a good fit for you and your business. Before you begin your response, make sure you fully understand its aims and, if in doubt about any question, contact the award organisers for clarification. Only then should you begin to write, taking care to tailor content to address each requirement.

A compelling narrative and the human element

Whether the award is for excellence in mortgage broking or innovation tourism makes no difference. What matters is that your submission has a clear and compelling narrative that captures the essence of what your company is all about and which is woven throughout your entire response.

This narrative goes beyond detailing your company’s mission and your journey from where you were to where you are today. Neither is it about simply listing a bunch of achievements or sales figures and hoping the judges will see how impressive they are. Rather, what a stand-out award submission will do is tell a story that connects with the judges on a sufficiently emotional or intellectual level to keep them reading right through to the end. This could be through inspiring stories, testimonials, personal anecdotes or the positive impact the company has had on individuals or communities.

Lesson 2: It’s important to develop an engaging narrative rather than a set of facts. Make sure to weave in individual stories, challenges faced, and triumphs achieved to make your journey to success more relatable. Remember, when a submission connects on an emotional level it can leave a lasting impression on the judging panel – and that’s always a good thing.

Demonstrating impact and results in award winning submissions

Judges are looking for evidence of real impact and results. This means also providing concrete metrics and data that showcase just how well you or your company has performed. Financial performance, growth statistics, market share, customer satisfaction scores, and so on should be presented clearly and persuasively. It’s not enough to say, ‘Sales for the year were well above expected.’ What does that even mean? On the other hand, saying, ‘At $230K, sales for the year were well above expected (2023: $190K), an impressive 21% increase’ paints a much clearer picture.

Lesson 3: Wherever possible, include specific, quantifiable results that demonstrate your business success. Highlight key performance indicators and use data to back up your claims. Ensure that the data is relevant and presented in a way that emphasises its significance.

Remember, it’s not always about how your figures look compared to others’ results. How much you’ve improved within your own business can be equally impressive.

Award winning submissions got innovation

A standout submission often features innovative solutions or practices that differentiate your business from your competitors. Judges will always be interested in how a company has approached challenges by leveraging creativity and forward-thinking strategies. Whether your innovation is related to new products, services, processes or business models, it should have had a significant impact on your business or your customers.

By the way, ‘innovation’ doesn’t always mean coming up with something new. We recently wrote a winning award entry for a client who ran a billboard advertising company. When the rest of the industry moved to almost exclusively online and social media advertising, he stuck to his guns and promoted giant, eye-catching billboards as ‘old style advertising for modern businesses’. Not only did he win his entrepreneur category, he was named national winner.

Lesson 4: In showcasing your innovative approaches or solutions, describe the problem, your innovative response, and the results. Emphasise how these innovations set you apart from others in the industry.

Customer focus and engagement

Questions on customer satisfaction and engagement feature heavily in many business awards. Judges will look for evidence that your company places a high priority on understanding and meeting your customers’ needs. This can include customer feedback, testimonials, and the ways in which your business has evolved in response to the customer input you receive.

Lesson 5: How well has how your company prioritised customer engagement and satisfaction? Provide concrete examples of how customer feedback has influenced your strategies or operations, highlighting any initiatives that have led to improved customer experiences. Wherever possible, back up your claims with data. For example, ‘Since introducing our “Easy As” colour selection process, carpet sales have risen by 34% in the last six months.’

Continuous improvement

Judges value companies that show a commitment to continuous improvement and professional development as elements that support sustained business growth. A winning submission should include examples of how your company has evolved and how it has adapted to market, legislative or industry changes. Judges will also be looking for evidence of your investment in your people; your commitment to the professional growth of your team.

Lesson 6: Show that your business is dynamic and forward-thinking by providing evidence of how it has adapted in recent challenging times. Describe the types of career pathways you offer to your employees and highlight the positive impact of training and development on your staff retention strategies.

Strong leadership and team dynamics

Effective leadership and a cohesive team are key components of a successful business. Judges will focus on assessing how strong leadership has driven your company’s vision and how well your team collaborates to achieve goals. Importantly, effective leadership should be able to be linked to the creation of a positive company culture and a working environment that prioritises individual wellbeing.

Lesson 7: Take care to illustrate the role of leadership in guiding your company to greater success. How have your leaders inspired and motivated their teams, fostered a positive culture, and successfully driven strategic initiatives? Highlight any collaborative efforts that have positively affected business success.

Sustainability and corporate responsibility

Increasingly, judges are looking for clear evidence of a company’s commitment to sustainability and corporate responsibility. This aspect includes environmental initiatives, social responsibility programs, and ethical practices. A strong submission will demonstrate how a business contributes positively to the communities in which it works, such as supporting local charities, sporting clubs, local jobs for local people and so on. Additionally, the judges will want to hear what initiatives your business has implemented to lessen environmental impact, such as waste reduction, recycling programs, green energy and more.

Lesson 8: Include details about the efforts your business goes to in making a difference socially and environmentally. Even small initiatives can, collectively, make a big impact so don’t hesitate to describe all that you do. Show how individual and company-wide efforts align with your company values and how your efforts contribute to broader societal goals.

Effective communication and presentation

This is about how well you present your submission. We hear so often from judges that a sure-fire way for an entry to end up in the reject pile is for content to be presented haphazardly, almost as though it was written in a stream of consciousness style, with little thought for layout. A well-presented submission pays close attention to formatting and uses devices such as tables, graphics and subheadings to make content more easily digestible.

Lesson 9: Always allow enough time to ensure that your submission is well-written and well-organised. It pays to remember that judges have to read a great many award entries and they’ll look more favourably on ones that are easy to read, visually appealing, have well-organised sections and are error-free.

Calling in the professionals of award winning submissions

Award-winning submissions don’t just happen; they take a lot of time and effort to create – time and effort which may well be in short supply for busy companies. Many entrants in the award you’re considering applying for will take the forward-thinking step of engaging a professional award writer to ensure their entry is of the standard that judges expect to see.

Lesson 10: Consider the benefits of working with an expert award writer. They have the skills to transform your submission from a collection of facts and figures into a compelling narrative that showcases your achievements in the best possible light.

Next steps toward award winning submissions

Proof Communications has a whole team of award writers standing by ready to assist you. Get in touch today or call us on +61 2 8036 5532 or 0448 566 377. We look forward to speaking with you soon.